Page 17 of The Chief (Those (Damn!) Texas Dantes #3)

Grigor shook his head. “The Russian I heard was clear. Something about holding position. Delaying. Not moving the cargo. My interpretation is that they’re not moving the cargo until next week.” He paused, then added, “Final phrase was clearer: ‘No one can know—especially the Dantes.’“

Cade spoke through gritted teeth. “Say it. In Russian. The exact words.”

Grigor hesitated—then obeyed. The sentences rolled off his tongue fluidly and precise.

Elise jerked.

Her eyes widened. Her grip tightened around her arms.

“That’s not what he said,” she breathed.

Cade’s head snapped toward her.

“What?”

Elise’s gaze was far away now, locked on something Cade couldn’t see. She spoke again, voice thready, distant. ”That’s not what he said.” Then she quoted the phrase in perfect Russian. ”Peremestite gruz. Vso dolzhno byt’ zakoncheno do voskresen’ya. Nikto ne dolzhen znat’ — osobenno Dantes.”

Cade’s pulse spiked, sharp and immediate, like a detonator had just been armed.

Grigor didn’t blink, but the slight shift in his weight, the way his shoulders drew back half an inch, didn’t go unnoticed.

Cade’s eyes narrowed. Every molecule in the room seemed to pause.

The air went thin, brittle with tension.

Elise’s voice still echoed in Cade’s mind, flawless Russian from his wife.

The words. The timing. The correction. Everything hung suspended. One breath away from combustion.

“I don’t speak Russian,” Elise whispered. “I just... remember.”

Her eyes met Cade’s, and something in her face cracked wide open.

It wasn’t just fear. It wasn’t just confusion.

It was the kind of visceral, unguarded recognition that sent every alarm in his body flaring.

Like she’d just stumbled onto a ghost. Like something inside her had been triggered in a way she didn’t fully understand.

The way her pupils dilated. The tremble that rippled down her arm.

Whatever she’d heard, whatever she remembered, it had rattled her to her bones.

And that twist in Cade’s gut sharpened into something worse. Something primal.

She’d heard it.

At the reception.

She’d been within earshot of a secret conversation, Russian phrasing, sensitive code.

And she had remembered every word. Exactly.

She’d just exposed a critical fault line in Grigor’s report. Not a slip. Not a misheard phrase. A lie. Deliberate. Clean. Dangerous. And she’d called it out in front of Cade, unintentionally or not, staking her ground against a man Cade had trusted for years.

Grigor’s hand moved. Casual at first. A downward drift to the hem of his coat, like scratching an itch or brushing away lint.

A move Cade had seen a hundred times before.

But this time, something was off. The hand didn’t stop at the fabric.

It lingered. Hovered. The subtle tightening of Grigor’s jaw.

The slight lift of his chest as he drew a measured, steady breath. Cade’s intuition howled.

That wasn’t habit.

That was a tell.

Cade stepped forward, body angling to block Grigor’s line of sight to Elise. His stance widened, instinct taking over. He didn’t have a weapon holstered, he rarely needed one in the house. But his weight shifted into a ready crouch, legs braced, eyes locked on Grigor’s hand.

It hovered too long near his coat.

And Cade didn’t trust hesitation from any man with kill-training in his blood.

“Lieutenant,” Cade said, voice cold.

Grigor moved quick.

Cade moved quicker.

He lunged, but Grigor’s draw was faster than a lie. The gun cleared his coat and fired in one motion, just as Cade hit him.

They collided hard.

The shot cracked through the air a split second before Cade slammed Grigor into the wall, the echo of it still ringing in his ears as their bodies rammed together. Cade’s hand wrenched the gun upward a heartbeat too late.

Elise.

Her cry cut through him, high and raw and keening. He didn’t need to turn. Didn’t need to look. He knew.

She’d been hit.

And it was his fault he hadn’t stopped it in time.

He didn’t dare look back. Couldn’t. If he did, he might lose his edge. Might lose her.

Grigor struggled, snarling, the muscles in his arm straining as he fought to bring the weapon to bear.

His fingers clamped around the grip, knuckles bloodless, elbow driving against Cade’s ribs in a last, vicious push for leverage.

Cade slammed him back, shoulder to sternum, grinding the breath from Grigor’s lungs, but still the bastard clung to the gun like a dying man with nothing left to lose.

Their boots scraped against the floor, a brutal dance of pure violence, desperate, bone-deep, and inches from deadly.

With a snarl, Cade drove his knee into Grigor’s gut, doubling the bastard over just enough to reach for his boot.

His hand shot down, fingers closing around the hilt of the blade he always carried, not for show, not for intimidation, but for moments exactly like this.

He yanked it free, drove it straight up under the sternum, into the heart.

Grigor spasmed once. Cade twisted the blade hard, his expression carved from stone. Then he ripped it free, shoved Grigor off him, and let the bastard crumple to the floor. Cade didn’t watch him hit the ground, only heard his gun skitter across the floor.

He spun, wild and off-balance, his chest already seizing with dread.

The second he tore his eyes from the body slumping to the floor, he knew, knew what he’d see, that he’d been too late.

His heart punched hard against his ribs as his gaze found her.

Elise. Collapsing against the wall. A smear of red where her hand pressed urgently to her side.

She was sliding down, slow and silent, eyes wide with shock.

His stomach dropped out from under him. Every thought, every reflex, collapsed into a single command: get to her.

He reached her in an instant. Kneeling. Gathering her into his arms.

“Elise. Look at me.”

Her eyes were unfocused.

“Didn’t mean to,” she whispered. “Didn’t know... I just remembered...”

“I know,” he said, pressing both palms to the wound now. “I know.”

“Hurts.”

“I’ve got you.”

“I didn’t know what it meant...”

“Doesn’t matter. You’re going to be fine.”

Cade’s voice turned lethal. “Medic!”

It was a roar, harsh and commanding, the kind that shattered silence and sent boots scrambling.

He didn’t look up. Couldn’t, though he heard frantic movement around him from his men.

His hands were slick with blood, fingers digging into the wound like pressure alone could stop it.

Her breathing hitched, thin and fast, and she let out the faintest whimper when his palm pressed harder.

“Stay with me,” he said again, barely more than a growl. “Eyes on me, Elise. You hold on. That’s an order.”

Her lashes fluttered. Another tremor passed through her, more violent this time, as though her body was rejecting the pain but couldn’t escape it.

Her skin had gone from flushed to chalky, lips tinged with gray, and her breaths were so shallow they barely lifted her chest. Her fingers twitched once against his blood-soaked shirt, like she was reaching for something. Or maybe just holding on.

He lowered his forehead to hers for one brief second, one breath of grounding fury and fear, a silent vow pressed against her skin.

His eyes squeezed shut, just long enough to burn the image of her into the inside of his lids, as if that would keep her there.

Her breath ghosted against his mouth, unsteady and faint, and he forced his own to stay steady for both of them.

Then he lifted his head, eyes snapping toward the open door, already figuring who he’d kill next if help didn’t come now. ”Where the fuck is my medic?!”

Footsteps pounded the hall outside, fast, heavy, purposeful.

Cade barely turned his head, but he heard the chaos coming.

Doors slammed open in rapid succession, shouted commands ricocheting off stone walls.

The sound of boots skidding across marble.

The rustle of a med bag unzipping. Voices barking names he didn’t process.

Finally—finally—relief burst into the room, but not fast enough. Not nearly fast enough.

“Get Dr. Vale. Now. And bring the trauma kit. Lock down the wing.”

Guards scattered.

Cade looked back down.

Elise’s breath rasped, thin and irregular, a rhythm Cade could barely track.

Her lashes fluttered, lids struggling to stay open, as though consciousness itself had become too heavy.

The blood kept coming, thick and dark, soaking through his shirt, matting to her skin.

That shirt had been hers only minutes ago, worn with teasing confidence.

Now it clung to her like a death shroud.

Her fingers, once clenched, had fallen limp against her side.

He pressed harder, growling under his breath, his pulse thundering in his ears.

Rage. Helplessness. Terror. It surged up his throat in one violent wave as her warmth started to slip from beneath his touch.

He’d been shot before. He’d seen worse. But never like this.

Never her.

Never Elise.

His wife.

Someone inside the house had betrayed them.

Grigor hadn’t acted alone. Cade knew it in his bones, the calm confidence, the timing, the lie told without hesitation. This ran deeper. Wider.

There was another mole on Dante payroll.

And that someone was going to bleed.

Worse than Grigor did.

But first, Elise had to live.

His hands shook against her skin, trying to hold in her life with nothing but pressure and will. He couldn’t lose her. Not now. Not after last night. Not after everything they hadn’t said but had still felt. She was his.

And if she died—

No. He wouldn’t let her.

Cade bent over her again, pressed his lips to her temple, and whispered a promise only she could hear.

“Stay with me, amore mio. I’m not done choosing you. Not even close. You carry my mark, my soul branded into yours, and I’ll tear this world apart before I let it take you from me.

Then the medics flooded in.

Cade kept Elise cradled against him, one arm wrapped under her back, the other still pressed firm to her wound. Her blood soaked through his sleeves, hot and terrifyingly persistent. Her eyes fluttered, catching his just for a second. And in that instant, he saw it—her trust. Her fight.

And Cade didn’t look away from her once.